“But, Saintess… Lady Cordelia is…”

Rashid, who was seated across from her, hesitated as he spoke, but Shartiel brushed it off with a light laugh.

No one sitting at this table could be ignorant of the relationship between Cordelia and Shartiel.

“Cordelia has Blue Stella Island. Make sure that the money from selling Blue Stella Island’s rubies flows not to the Empress Consort, but to Prince Carleon. Not a single coin missing.”

In her past life, once Cordelia became a crown princess candidate, Clark Nion poured out his entire fortune to support Carleon.

This time as well, their wealth had to flow toward Carleon and not to Ares.

***

After more than two hours of meeting, Carleon and Shartiel headed back to the imperial palace.

They chose to ride in an old carriage used by commoners, planning to disembark near the palace forest.

“Will you be all right?”

In the carriage, with only the two of them, Carleon asked Shartiel, who was seated across from him, in a low voice.

Was she truly fine with another woman becoming his prospective wife?

Was she truly without the slightest stir of emotion?

“What? That Cordelia is becoming a candidate for crown princess? So what? It’s not as if she’s really going to become crown princess.”

With her hand inside her robe pocket, fidgeting, Shartiel wrinkled her nose as if it were nothing.

Carleon felt a needless irritation and turned his gaze toward the pocket that bulged and twitched faintly.

“Shartiel, I don’t need Cordelia’s money to become emperor. I’m confident of that.”

Inside that pocket must be the oval-shaped watch she cherished.

Perhaps even the one he had given her.

“I know. But I can’t stand by and watch that money go elsewhere. Take it. Take it and give it to me. Because it was mine to begin with.”

She fixed him with a resolute gaze, her expression as firm as the pebbles on the Blue Stella Island shore.

The beach of Blue Stella Island, famous for its blue shells and colorful little stones.

She, whose innocence had once shone as brightly as those pebbles said to rival gemstones, now had a fading light in her eyes.

Perhaps it wasn’t Cordelia but himself who had stolen that from her.

“I will return everything to you. I swear it on my life.”

As Carleon spoke with firm resolve, the fidgeting hand inside her pocket stilled.

Entranced, Shartiel looked at him—just as the carriage arrived at the palace forest.

“We have arrived, Saintess.”

“Please wait just a moment, James.”

Shartiel gave James a brief instruction, then withdrew her hand from her pocket.

“I fixed it. I’ll give it back to you.”

“Why? Did you not like it?”

Carleon accepted the watch she had been fiddling with for so long.

So much had she handled it that her warmth lingered upon it.

“Of course not. I saw it in the portrait. It’s your father’s keepsake, isn’t it?”

Shartiel picked up the silver chain that slipped down from her palm and curled it neatly onto his.

In that brief moment, the chain had lost her warmth; now cold, it tickled his palm as it settled in place.

“Now time won’t stay stopped anymore. So from this point forward, you must never be late again.”

As she spoke, the second hand moved ever so slightly at a steady pace.

Tick—at the faint sound of the pocket watch’s hand, his heart surged violently.

“All right. I will never be late. Not for you.”

The hands pointed to twelve.

The time that had been frozen since Adrian’s death began to flow once more for Carleon.

***

The Harvest Festival was just one day away.

During this time, Shartiel refrained from meeting Carleon, spending all the hours not at the Saint Medela Clinic together with Ares.

Emperor Kaien even mobilized the imperial knights to prevent her from seeing Carleon, keeping every part of her under watch.

“Shoot that hawk!”

Early in the morning, a commotion arose before the fountain in the temple’s main courtyard.

A rosefinch, which had arrived early to endure the winter, was being pursued by a hawk.

Though it narrowly escaped several times, its weakening wings showed that it would soon be caught.

“Yes, Your Eminence!”

At Ares’s command, a temple knight drew his bow, and the hawk that had been swooping down on its prey fell headlong to the ground.

“A rosefinch…”

The pink sparrow that had been chased by the hawk fell into Ares’s embrace.

Just like Shartiel had once come running into him.

Ares looked down at the rosefinch catching its breath upon his palm.

Its tiny chest feathers rippled with the faintest breeze.

Even the tiniest mist scattering from the fountain seemed too heavy, making it shut its black eyes tight.

Ares gently cupped the bird with his other hand.

“Your Eminence! Isn’t that a rosefinch of fortune? Perhaps it has come to bless you in advance of tomorrow’s good news!”

Priest Norman forgot that he was supposed to remain composed before Ares and grew excited.

Indeed, Norman had been unusually cheerful lately.

Every day, the papers buzzed with rumors of Shartiel and Ares’s romance.

Which could only mean that Ares was about to be named crown prince.

“Your Eminence, will you keep it? If so, I shall clip its wings for you. That will make it easier to tame.”

Seeing Ares still holding the rosefinch in his hand, the commander of the temple knights extended a hand to take it.

No one, having gained such a rare rosefinch, would leave it untamed.

“No.”

Ares carefully held the bird and walked toward the main hall’s entrance.

He did not need to clip wings to tame it.

Not for the rosefinch—and not for Shartiel.

***

“Lord Ares, what is this pretty bird?”

That afternoon, just as Ares had confidently believed, the rosefinch had been tamed with only a few touches of his hand.

It now nestled inside his br*ast pocket as he entered the palace grounds.

Greeting him in the temple garden, Shartiel stroked the bird’s tiny head with her finger, marveling that she had never seen anything so lovely.

“A rosefinch. It came early for the winter but was chased by a hawk. I saved it.”

“You even tied a blue ribbon around its ankle. Did you give it a name?”

Shartiel asked as she gently pressed the bird’s feet while it hopped lightly on Ares’s palm without trying to escape.

As if annoyed by Shartiel, the bird darted back into Ares’s pocket.

“Hahaha. It’s just a rosefinch.”

When Ares laughed at Shartiel’s slightly disappointed look, passersby glanced at them.

Since Ares was always seen with a gentle smile, it was rare for him to laugh so openly and heartily.

“How unromantic.”

Shartiel pouted as she pressed down on the bird’s head. The bird suddenly stuck its head out and glared at her.

‘Shartiel versus Shartiel. I wonder who will win?’

In truth, Ares had given the bird a name. Shartiel.

He couldn’t think of any name but hers.

“Shartiel.”

Ares slid his hand behind her neck.

If he pulled her in now, she would have no choice but to kiss him.

If he carried her into any chamber of the palace, she would instantly be his.

“I could be romantic right this very moment.”

“Ares, it’s tomorrow.”

Shartiel hunched her shoulders and pushed his hand away, signaling with her eyes that he should mind his dignity in front of others.

“Every single day feels unbearably long to me, Shartiel.”

Truthfully, Ares felt a growing thirst for her.

She acted as though she was his, yet drew lines.

She had allowed him to leave kiss marks on her neck several times, yet she never let him claim her lips.

“Be patient. Tomorrow, I will be in the arms of the Crown Prince.”

With a coy smile in her eyes, Shartiel leaned her cheek against his chest.

Each time her breath fanned across his chest, he wanted to lay her beneath him immediately and show her to Carleon.

To prove that the woman he so tenderly called ‘Tiel’ was now utterly captivated by him.

“Shartiel.”

Her name rolled from his tongue like sticky summer candy, and Shartiel tightened her embrace around his waist.

“Just wait a little longer. Only His Highness the Crown Prince will be able to hold me.”

Her voice, soft and delicate like sparrow feathers, made Ares run his hand through her pink hair as he recalled last night’s dream—

Her, panting beneath him.

Her, writhing as she cried his name with aching desperation.

‘Tomorrow night, I look forward to it, Shartiel.’

When his hand, which had lingered on her pink hair, slid down to her waist, she flinched and stiffened immediately.

For some reason, she always reacted sensitively whenever he touched her waist, as though it were her weak spot.

Ares pulled her into a stronger embrace.

He closed his eyes as he felt her soft chest pressing against his torso.

‘Shartiel. Shartiel. My Shartiel.’

Just as in his dreams, he repeated her name over and over.

“I’ll wait, Shartiel.”

After steadying his roughened breathing, Ares lifted a lock of her hair and pressed a long kiss to it.

His lucky pink sparrow.

Tomorrow, he would have her completely.

Tomorrow, Carleon’s anguished cry would echo through the palace.

“To have you entirely.”

The cool autumn breeze caught her pink hair, fluttering it through his fingers.

***

The day of the Harvest Festival had arrived.

The nobles, dressed to perfection in newly tailored gowns and suits prepared for the occasion, entered the Imperial Temple.

“Lady Cordelia Nion, Young Countess!”

Cordelia, wearing a rather extravagant gown today, did not rush but walked gracefully toward the group that greeted her.

She briefly met Melissa’s eyes across the gathering but merely gave a nod before approaching her own circle.

‘Melissa became a candidate too.’

Not long ago, Empress Consort Victoria had ordered Duke Illus to select five candidates for Crown Princess to Carleon.

It was likely meant both to sever Carleon’s entanglement with Shartiel once and for all, and to counterbalance the influx of noble families with daughters who were pressing toward him.

‘Shartiel, watch closely. In the end, the seat beside Prince Carleon will be mine.’

To secure Cordelia’s candidacy, her father, Clark Nion, had tirelessly followed the Ten Great Houses day and night, bribing them at every turn.

Those lofty nobles disguised the bribes under the grand name of “donations to the South,” but a bribe was still a bribe.

‘Shartiel, even the Ten Great Houses now recognize me. You’ll remain locked in the temple forever, praying away your life.’

Of course, there were still four other candidates besides herself, but Cordelia and Melissa—with her northern army—were the most promising.

‘Or else you can spend your life as Ares’s shadow mistress.’

Cordelia looked up at Shartiel, who ascended the temple platform to preside over the ceremony, and smirked triumphantly, ridiculing her without end.

“A saintess does not become a concubine. She takes them.”

Indeed, Shartiel’s words had been true.

Bound to the temple for life, saintesses often kept lovers to endure their loneliness.

But if the man in question was a prince, things were different.

They could never formally take a prince as a lover.

He would remain only an unofficial shadow partner for the rest of her days.

‘When the prince’s attention fades, she’ll wither away in the temple with only her prayers. That’s what will happen to you too, Shartiel.’

Men’s interest faded quickly.

Even Emperor Rochester, who had once made the entire empire swoon with his love for Saintess Rosana, had lost interest in less than two years.

‘How many months will you last?’

Pfft. Cordelia couldn’t suppress a sneer, hiding her smirk behind her fan.